For many years there have been stories of some kind of entity that comes in the night and terrorizes people. Some call it "The Old Hag" syndrome but I do not think that quite covers it. This experience tends to vary from person to person. Some people do claim to see an old hag sitting on their chest. Others claim it is a black form, and others see nothing but feel as if something or someone climbs onto the bed and holds them down , and they can't move, scream or sometimes even breathe during this experience. It usually lasts for a few seconds that seem like forever and leaves the person very shaken up or cold when it is over.It seems to happen at times in the daytime also, so perhaps it is not just a "nighttime" experience at all. Now I have heard stories from folks who say they were asleep and were woken up by it, others who say they were awake and still others who say they were in the in between stages of sleep and wake-fullness. Some of these events are brought on by sleep paralysis, a condition that is normal and that the body causes, to keep us from getting up and acting out our dreams. For more on this common natural event with sleep paralysis go to: http://www.livescience.com/49457-sleep-paralysis-hallucinations.html Recently sleep paralysis has also been linked to genetics: http://www.livescience.com/49818-sleep-paralysis-genetic-basis.html

Not all of these events that have taken place in bed can be attributed to sleep paralysis however.

Everyone who has told me of their experience with this, agrees on one thing...something climbed onto the bed and accosted them. Strangely enough the majority of what I call "night Crusher" incidents have occurred in a home where there was already a certain amount of paranormal activity of other kinds, that would point to the possibility of a ghost being in the home. Scientists attribute this experience to a waking dream and /or sleep paralysis, which makes the person unable to move or scream. Almost all of the people who have had this experience say they were laying on their backs. I find this curious as on one's back is also the same position in which a person is most likely to trance out, meditate or attempt to astral travel. Is it possible ,that these folks went down to some altered state that allowed contact with this entity? This is often a hypnogogic state which often settles in right before we fall asleep or when we first start to awaken. How many people claim they were almost asleep when they heard someone call their name? Is this also a coincidence? Now I have never experienced this night crushing phenomenon, thank goodness and do not hope to. I sleep on my side not my back.

I have heard night crusher stories from all kinds of people from all walks of life over the years. And in one of my cases, four different people were night crushed in the home, some of them guests who knew nothing about the experiences of the residents there. Now can this case be chalked up to sleep paralysis? Mass hallucination? I find it difficult to accept that in cases like the one I just mentioned that this strange experience can be dismissed as coincidence. One of the crusher victims in this particular home was a 235 pound man who was wide awake lying in the bed when it happened. It would take a lot of power to hold down that man, wouldn't you think? We later discovered that the ghost in the home was a relative who lived there for a long time and she just wanted to be close to her family members again, scaring the living daylights out of them in the process. So now what? What does this tell us about the night crusher events? Maybe not all are intentionally malevolent or predatory after all.

There was another case of a teenage boy who was accosted by a similar crushing entity in the early morning in a new home that his family had just moved into. He managed to fight it off before it could really get a grip and said it never happened again.

People with bad hearts are the ones who suffer the worst with a night crusher experience. I had one case where the victim of this repeated attack had a bad heart and actually went to stay somewhere else until the activity was reduced in the home. Anyone with a heart condition should not live in a haunted location. The same applies for people with mental or emotional handicaps. Spirit activity can have a detrimental affect on anyone who is in bad health physically or mentally.

Just for FYI: 85 percent of all "night crusher" episodes are in reality related to sleep paralysis and not to any actual spirit activity.

We are interested in hearing about night crusher experiences that have a different aspect from any of the usual ones listed above, so if you have experienced something of this nature with some different elements please send us an email and tell us about it.